One Sixty: Whip Crackin' is Backin' Action!

Whip Crackin' is Backin' Action!

Hello world! I'm back and highly motivated! HIGHLY motivated. No, I'm still not ready to run, skip, jump, or other leg-type-activities. But I am in good spirits. And no, I haven't been drinking spirits... mmmm, spirits.

Back to the subject.

So, last week I devoted myself to a tedious planning task not to be undertaken by the faint of heart... or faint of butt. Because it requires a large amount of time on your butt. Since most of my time as of late has been of the butt-sitting variety - I decided it was high time. So, I got out my pencil (which is hard enough because I despise pencils. Stupid pencils.) and I got out my paper. And I got out my tape measure..... which I then broke. So I got out my other tape measure! And then I got out my laptop and went to work.

I painstakingly measured my kitchen. And then I went to ikea.com. And thus commenced the hours and hours of drawing, erasing, adding, clicking on stuff, drawing some more, calculating, moving, erasing some more, getting another pencil, getting another piece of paper - etc etc. And by the end of the third day, I had created - KITCHEN! And it was good.

Why? Well, it is true that we have a kitchen. I found my cabinets for $200 at a yard sale - full set! More actually, then I ended up using. And I do like them - I like the color and all. But they are old.

And in the very near future - we are going to have to rip them all out anyway to fix the drywall in the kitchen, which got the biggest beating from the whole house-lift-basement. Sooooo, if we have to take them all out anyway - why not put back new ones? And in a coolio configuration designed by me instead of in a hap-hazard make 'em fit or else kind of former configuration? Capeesh?

The design is totally awesome and reflects the fact that I spent waaaay too much time on it. And really, it won't even be too expensive. I already have the countertop - which will still fit as long as we don't break it getting it out. And we already have an awesome granite sink and newish appliances. (Except for the fridge which is totally too expensive for words.)

Under all realistic conditions - none of this madness would even think about starting until after next year. There's too much other stuff to be accomplished. But I'm working on that too....

Blog Story

My now husband Mike and I purchased this quaint home back in spring of 2004 - our first home - and, being the handy folks we are, expected to have the entire thing renovated in about a year or so.

And here we still are... renovating away.

This house needed a complete overhaul. Its plaster walls were uninsulated, its attic floor covered in 2" of bat guano, its basement - dirt and snakes, its exterior - asbestos siding, and lead paint windows in every room. The electric had not been updated and light sockets hung bare from the ceiling. Plumbing featured cast iron radiators - and only one for the entire upstairs.

We began by gutting almost the entire house from top to bottom. (sans bathroom - we needed to pee) We rebuilt the entire upstairs, with a new floor (not new carpet or wood - the once unstable framing underneath) and turned 3 small rooms into two. We reinvented the downstairs by turning a closet into a hallway and eliminating interior exterior windows and doors from old half-assed additions.

New insulation, windows, electrical wiring (including phone and CAT-5 internet), plumbing and baseboards, and drywall were all added.

We purchased kitchen cabinets from a yard sale. (None existed previously.) Our families helped us replace and purchase new appliances including the once also missing washer & dryer.

Then we had the entire house lifted - straight into the air - dug out the dirt, and had a real basement foundation poured. We updated our oil tank and burner and created heating zones.

Outside, we took down trees and planted grass. We dug out an awkward hill to create a 2nd part to the driveway and used the rocks our house once sat on as a retaining wall. We electrified and repainted the garage.

And of course, we spent many an hour on finish work like paint, trim, closet doors, lighting fixtures, hardwood floors, curtain rods, dimmer switches, and many other things everyone else takes for granted. We are still working to complete all this final finishing, but happy to report that we are FINALLY nearing completion of all little things in all rooms!

In 2008 we began overhauling the exterior by creating a new french door entryway and building a farmer's porch and garage addition. We replaced our roof and then stripped off our siding and replaced with new clapboards. We then planted two new flowering trees and a maple in the front yard - our first major landscape purchases. I'm happy to report that here in 2011, the porch is nearing completion and the back yard is on the road to recovery with some new loam and grass. More plantings soon to come!

In 2012 we plan to attack the last MAJOR (emphasis on major) job in the house - the dreaded BATHROOM! We plan to first add a second bathroom in the basement. Then, demolish our current bathroom and rebuild it, adding a second bathroom on top for the upstairs.

And that pretty much brings you up to date. The battle continues day to day as we try and complete everything.

1 comments:

Anonymous said...: I did the ikea thing and I also did the deepho mills pride kitchen builder. I love ikea, but I don't think I could afford the stuff I really love there, and then I'd be sad that I went with second choice. So I'm caving and going for super cheap. So when it breaks, stains, falls apart... no guilt!; 2:39 PM